2. analog
  3. 119127-117

Your favorite BEACH BOYS LP besides PET SOUNDS

I generally prefer their Post Pet Sounds LP's.  Mine is Sunflower, with honorable mention to Surf's Up. 

fjn04
tubegroover
2,320 posts
 
Hi fjn04, if it's SOUND you're after try the Telarc and other recordings of Papa doo run run, that did covers of many Beach Boy songs. Really superterrific recordings for audiophiles looking for sound quality  but I must say, lacking the "soul" of Brian Wilson's unique falsetto :)

 
fjn04 OP
1,561 posts
 
Some really cool posts, thanks for sharing. I'm 50 in a couple of months, so I grew up with Pink Floyd, Zeppellin, YES, and others which I've moved on from. bdp24- So between Smiley Smile and the Smile Sessions, you would opt for the latter.
bdp24's avatar
bdp24
9,868 posts
 

Definitely fjn04. Smiley Smile was put together by Carl Wilson after Brian crashed and burned, the end result of constant questioning and resistance from Mike Love (who didn't at all understand Smile, musically or lyrically---he demanded Van Dyke Parks explain the meaning of those in "Surf's Up", and wanted to "stick to the formula"---he liked the lifestyle The Beach Boys afforded him) and pressure from Capitol Records for "product". Plus, Brian was taking a lot of drugs, LSD and Cocaine mostly, and becoming increasingly unhinged, getting paranoid (he thought his house and studio had been "bugged" by Phil Spector, to steal his ideas) and seeing "numbers" in everything---he believed in Numerology, and thought he was being "spoken to". He was also losing his self-confidence, becoming paralyzed with self-doubt. Not a pretty picture, is it?

Anyway, Carl described Smiley Smile as a bunt to Smile's home run. Carl used some of the Smile recordings, some unreleased material, and some newly-recorded Brian-less stuff, and pretty much just threw together an album. We will never have Smile as it was originally to be, as Brian fell apart before it was completed. By the way, three issues of the great music magazine Crawdaddy contain Paul Williams' (not the singer/songwriter, but the music critic) account of the Smile story as it was happening in 1967. Those three installments were included in Paul's book "Outlaw Blues", a must read.   

fjn04 OP
1,561 posts
 

Awesome- and thanks for the tip on Outlaw Blues. I thought Love and Mercy was a very good movie. In an interview with Brian and his wife, he also gave his blessing to the movie. They found it a hard watch, which I guess is an indication it was pretty true to reality. If memory serves, that interview was done by Whoopi Goldberg of all people. She must have/had a talk show. Acoustic Sounds is out of the Smile Sessions, so I will seek it out from one of the other vendors. I know it's still available. Cheers -Don


tubegroover
2,320 posts
 
Thanks Bdp24, yes we are about the same age except I grew up in South Jersey. The BB got me into surfing as a teenager even. Ironically none of the BB except Dennis actually surfed and was the one that came up with their name. While I loved the BB, like yourself up through Pet Sounds, I lost interest until Sunflower. I never warmed up to Smiley Smile or Wild Honey. I really got into some of the groups you mentioned along with Buffalo Springfield, The Doors and particularly Led Zepplin along with many of the Motown groups throughout the 60's. Early Poco was also a favorite, those great vocal harmonies! It wasn't until Sunflower that I became  reacquainted although I  enjoyed "Do it Again" from the late 60's a revisit of their earlier stuff and a great summer song. My 2nd favorite behind "Pet Sounds" is "Surf's Up". I didn't actually see the Beach Boys in concert until around 1972 when they were drawing huge crowds as a nostalgia act but without Brian, even so it was a great show and fulfilled a long held desire to see them perform.  
More to discover